The Early Years Part 2

    My father had to do something different, and it was very apparent that he had no choice. He won’t say it, and my grandfather is not here to talk about it but remember this is though my eyes not his.     

    My grandfather had 6 kids, and he seemed to believe that the first born was more important than each child that succeeded the next. Therefore, the oldest obtained the most and my dad was the last born. What exactly did this mean? Well when it came down to it he was the low man on the totem pole. The last thought, as he was the baby. 

    He decided to go out on his own and leave the family business. He originally went to college for a degree in agriculture. At the time a college education was not as important as it had become in the early 2000’s. He was able to start out as a mechanic at a grape farming company, not table grapes but wine grapes. The fertile Salinas valley is sometimes called the salad bowl well, because they grow a lot of things that go in salad. 

    The harvest season was long, and he was gone for weeks at a time sometimes. Can you imagine 3 young boys and their poor mother who never had a chance. We were busy little guys it was interesting, and now that I am raising children of my own I have no idea how she kept up.  I can only assume it was a lot of work, and there was no computer games or iPads to keep us busy. Luckily we had a large yard and played outside a lot. Heck we were little farmers in the back yard.  

    It didn’t take long for dads boss to see he was a hard worker, he basically noticed this when he came to the hardware store and saw my dad work. You see I am pretty sure he headhunted my dad right out of the hardware store. A short time after he was hired as a mechanic he was promoted to a supervisor. 

    I feel like I missed something, you see my dad was a jack of all trades. I never thought anything of it growing up because he could pretty much do anything with his hands. From working on cars, to remodeling a house or even building furniture. 

    The fact of the matter he could do anything, he was a worker and a leader all rolled up into one. He wasn’t afraid to get dirty when he needed to, but he could also dress up and lead the meeting if needed. He does a lot of the latter now, but who could blame him he is getting up there in age. The thing was it wasn’t uncommon for him to be overseeing his many employees, but also get under the hood of a harvester and get greasy. When it was harvest season, we knew he would be home much and when he was he was sleeping.